wishing everything that changed would be the same
by Wilhelmina Willoughby
Summary: AU L/J. 'She looks terribly undecided, and scared, and nervous, and overwhelmed, and sad. Mostly she looks alone, and he hates that, hates that he had everything to do with that. "I'm so sorry, Lily," he says finally, because he is. God, is he sorry.'


_A/N: Still working on a variety of things. Thanks so much for your everlasting patience._

_I rediscovered my love for William Fitzsimmon's song, "It's Not True," (stole the title for this from his lyrics) and I watched the video and listened to it again and again and here this is. I really love it, and I hope you do, too._

_As always,  
Mina_

_

* * *

  
_

The night is a deep, deep dark, and in this darkness the fluorescence of the Goose Creek Inn sign, flickering and dull, shines on a small rain puddle in the parking lot. She peers out at the puddle from behind musty curtains, the window and her damp face reflecting the same red-orange. She can't decide what color it is.

A sigh.

The air conditioner kicks on. It's loud and obtrusive and it reminds her of the air conditioner he tried to help her install in her little apartment window the other day. When things were normal. Kind of. When they were speaking, at least, and that's when her heart was warmer; not like it is now, a weird ice-hot, fire-cold.

Another sigh.

She drops the curtains and shuffles to the bed. It creaks as she sits. Her knees feel like they creak as she sits. She feels old -- she's twenty, she's still a kid, for God's sake, what does she know about responsibility?

---

_Nothing. _

He decides that he knows nothing about responsibility. At his tiny little apartment, there are still red plastic cups sitting around from his latest game of beer pong. There is still a trophy sitting on his coffee table -- a hand-me-down from his grandmother's house, because when has he ever felt like buying furniture -- that proclaims him Beer Pong Champion. He's twenty and that's the most he's ever accomplished.

He adjusts himself. He's long and lanky, and the backseat of his busted car is tiny and uncomfortable, but why not. Why not lie in the backseat of his two-door in the pot-holed parking lot of an ancient inn? Why not rest a cell phone on his forehead, waiting on a call that probably won't come anytime soon?

Why the hell not.

The orange is getting on his last fucking nerve, though, so he crosses his arms, pulls his hat down over his eyes, and waits.

---

She starts to think that it's more of a red, that light. Or maybe it's the red of the veins in her eyes, or of the red swell of her lips from biting them too much. Or maybe it's just red-orange. Maybe she's thinking too much.

Maybe she's not thinking enough.

Maybe that night was just a whole mess of not thinking. They'd won beer pong -- not surprising. They were the best team. They still kept drinking afterward, though, everybody did, because it was fun and they were friends and that's what you did at a party, you drank and played games and you took a guy into his bedroom after everybody left and you kissed him nice and slow and red and then you just didn't think, did you?

Did you?

---

It was stupid, he knows it, because she was -- is? -- his friend. But God, her hands, and yeah she smelled like alcohol a little but she still smelled like citrus and it was like falling in love with her, only it was probably just lust because he didn't -- doesn't? -- really know her all that well. He knows the way she smiles as she greets her friends, and how she offers drinks to his guests with that polite little upswing at the end of her question, and the way her hair falls over her back as she leans to toss the ping pong ball, and how she fits in his arms, and the noises she makes.

Stupid.

He's so stupid.

Because now there's this thing there and he doesn't know if they're friends or if they're not or if they're more or if he's just going to be an awkward matter of inconvenience, now that they have this responsibility.

He doesn't really know too much of anything.

---

She doesn't know what she's going to do. She's still got school. He's still got school. They've both got possibilities and opportunities and a wide-open world that is starting to close all the more slowly as she looks into the ugly wallpaper like reading the map of her decision. Un-decision.

Accident.

She imagines sitting it down in the future and saying the word. Accident. You were an accident. She imagines it's heartbreak and it breaks her heart a little and she doesn't even know the thing yet. She doesn't know if she wants to know it. If it's right to know it. If she should, or if he wants to, or if it's the best decision for everybody -- because she already made the un-decision, so she ought to at least make one real one.

But it's hard.

It's there, and she's alone, and the night is so dark that she just wants to disappear into the old mirror looking at her bed. Bloody Mary.

Or just Mary. After all, she's kind of bad at the blood part, lately.

---

His heart pumps slowly, a slow, slow, slow, almost still beat that lets him know that he's still awake and still has to wait up for her.

Because he needs to. Because he has to. Because he's going to.

He wants to.

He wants a lot of things. He wants to finish school. He wants to get a job and have a career and bring home a paycheck and hey, honey, I'm home. A house would be nice, and a big car with safety seats, and get-togethers in the backyard that don't involve drinking games but a grill and a patio set and a safety gate around the pool.

And she's there, somewhere, because now there's the thing and because he doesn't want to let any of this go. Sure, it's out of order and messed up and now he's just another statistic but he could love her, and it, and all of them together.

He could.

---

It begins to dawn on her -- an orange-ish color -- that she could do it. She could juggle school, and work, and raising another person. She could manage paying rent and multiple kinds of payments and going to the store late at night and studying for a final and waking up for a feeding and cooking dinner and balancing a checkbook and cleaning house and resting at the end of a long, long day with someone she could learn to love.

Her mom did everything in the right order, as did her sister, but she's always done things differently, a little off-the-page, so why not?

She could do it.

She stands. _They _could do it. If he wants. She doesn't know him all that well to predict what he'd feel about any of it, but she knows the softness in his eyes when he'd look at her, and the gentle pressure of his fingers, and his laugh, and the elation he made her feel as he swung her around the room after their victory.

This could be a kind of victory, too, right? The biggest game ever? They're the best team, so why not?

---

He picks up his phone. It's two in the morning. He places it back on his forehead.

He hates the waiting game, but it's a game and he doesn't give up, ever, so he waits and listens to his heart and the crickets outside and the buzz of the inn sign nearby.

There's a chiming sound.

His hand snaps to his forehead and knocks his phone off, right to the floorboard, and right under the passenger seat. Underneath, the sound is muffled, but thank Jesus there's a light on the front of his phone because he reaches under, scoops it up easy, and puts it to his ear on the third ring.

It's her.

---

He answers.

The call log on her phone -- that's fell somewhere underneath the bed when she dropped it, forgotten -- says that they're on the phone for six seconds. It takes her two to reach the door, three to take a deep breath, and thirty-eight to make up her mind.

Yes.

No.

Yes?

But by the time she's made up her mind to not make up her mind, the doorknob moves underneath her hand and she steps back as the door swings open.

---

She looks terribly undecided, and scared, and nervous, and overwhelmed, and sad. Mostly she looks alone, and he hates that, hates that he had everything to do with that.

So he pulls off his hat and keeps to his side of the doorway -- afraid to come in, afraid to back up, utterly scared shitless to move a step from where he is. He doesn't want to break this. She stares at him and he stares at her and he just doesn't…

What now?

---

"James?"

He doesn't speak. He doesn't make a sound. He just stands in the doorway like he's afraid she'll break down if he comes any closer, like she'll hit him or cry or shove him away if he even breathes in the wrong way.

She won't.

She'll try not to, anyway.

"James," she says again, and she takes a step back, hoping that he'll take a step forward, or he'll say something, or he'll blink or shake his head or move, anything.

---

"I'm sorry," he says finally, because he is. God, is he sorry. He's a sorry person, and he's sorry for what he -- they? -- did, and he's sorry that their accident turned into such a clusterfuck of epic proportions. He's sorry for wishing that it wasn't true, and sorry for wishing for a mistake, and sorry for all the anxiety he's caused the both of them.

He says it again as he watches her move back, back, back to the bed, and once more, "I'm so sorry, Lily," as she lies down and rests her head on the pillow. She's still watching him.

It's probably stupid, but he steps into the room, locks the door behind him, and, slowly-almost-still, timidly, carefully, he rests beside her. They don't touch. They breathe the same foot of air, they stare at one another, and they wait, very aware of what's between them.

And she says, "I'm sorry," because she is, because she wants to reach up to touch his face but won't. Because she needs this space just as much as she needs to feel him, even the tiniest part of his fingertips on hers.

She doesn't ask what they should do, and neither does he, and they sleep, in the cold, silent, deep red-orange darkness and in the morning, they'll go about their new lives with new hearts and new possibilities and opportunities and a world wide open.

In the future, they'll have a house with two stories and a large backyard and an empty garage. In the small bedroom next to the master's, just three steps away, they'll paint a white goose on the back of the door.

* * *


End file.
